- 3 months ago
- #considerthis
A new report by IMAN Research offers some rare insight into the aspirations and anxieties of Malay youth. It tells the story of a generation that is beginning to feel disillusioned and overlooked. So can we truly listen to the voices of young Malays, before we risk their disillusionment becoming entrenched? On this episode of #ConsiderThis Melisa Idris speaks with Aziff Azuddin, Research Associate at IMAN Research, and author of the report, ‘Orang Kita: Malay Youth Democratic Renewal Post-GE 15: The Politics of Acknowledgement and Resentment’.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Hello and good evening. I'm Melissa Idris. Welcome to Consider This.
00:14This is the show where we want you to consider and reconsider what you know of the news of the day.
00:19A new report by Iman Research offers some rare insight into the aspirations and anxieties of
00:27Malay youth. The report is titled Orang Kita, Malay Youth Democratic Renewal Post-GE15,
00:35The Politics of Acknowledgement and Resentment. And it tells a story of a generation that is
00:41beginning to feel disillusioned and overlooked. Now the question we want to ask tonight is how
00:48can we truly listen to the voices of young Malays before we risk their disillusionment becoming
00:56entrenched? Joining me on the show is Research Associate at Iman Research, Azif Azuddin,
01:02who is also the lead for the report. Azif, thank you so much for being on the show with me today.
01:07Thank you, Melissa. There's a lot to talk about with this study that you did. I understand it's
01:14a combination of a two-year-long effort on your part. Yes, it was. But talk to me about why it
01:20began. What prompted this study to focus specifically on Malay youth and who did you talk to? Where were
01:28they? Are they representative of a voice of an entire nation? Yeah. So we started out this report
01:35because one, we noticed that after the 2022 general elections, there was a huge swath of support for
01:44Perikata National, specifically coming from the Malay youth voting bloc. So if you see Bridget
01:49Wells' study that I think she published quite quickly after the elections, we saw that the number
01:54was 37% of youths voted for Perikata National. And a lot of political responses to that essentially
02:03was, oh, this was a green wave. The youth wanted Islamization, which I think in another show that
02:09we did like last year, two years ago, I think we kind of addressed that, right? So it wasn't, we, we wanted to approach it from this isn't
02:16necessarily ideological, which is not necessarily true. But what are the other factors that drove youths to
02:24vote for Perikata National? Were there material factors? Was it in the sense where, was there a question of
02:29economic reality? Was there a question of like, how they were, what were the environments, what were the
02:33environments that were shaping their views? Okay. So our methodology for this study essentially was
02:38that we wanted to basically go into the, what is known as the Malay heartlands, basically where
02:43PAS and UMNO have historically battled it out. And in the recent, in the recent elections, state and federal
02:50otherwise, we saw a lot of states flip over to Perikata National state rule, right? So these are kind of like
02:56the states where we spend most of the time with, we interviewed a lot of young Malay youths. And this
03:02ranged across the different backgrounds. You had youths who are, you know, in their spare time,
03:07they were artists, they were white quality workers, they were entrepreneurs, they were gig workers,
03:11they were youth activists. So basically we wanted to get kind of like a large, from a qualitative
03:16perspective, 100 plus voices, which is a large sample for a qualitative study to kind of get like an
03:22thematic idea of like, what are the material realities or what are kind of like also the political,
03:28psychological factors that made them choose Perikata National. And that's basically where the study was.
03:34So it started out as kind of understanding how Malay youth are voting. But what I really liked about
03:40this report and your work in general, Azif, is there is so much nuance to it. So it's gone beyond just
03:46understanding what drives a political choice. It's understanding what drives anxieties and what drives
03:54hopefulness amongst aspirations amongst Malay youth. So I want to delve into that. I want to explore more
04:03about the nuance of that. So there were some news headlines following your report that had, you know,
04:09Malay youth and made, I think, glaring what kind of one line headlines. But in your explanation of the
04:18nuance of the findings of your survey, how would you like us to understand the use of the phrase
04:24acknowledgement and resentment as you're using it in the report? Yeah. So when we talk about
04:29acknowledgement, I think we want to look at Undi 18 and how Undi 18, when it was stabled and built and now
04:35made part of law. And I think it was done in 2019, if not mistaken. So that I, that you can say,
04:41was one of Malaysia's attempts to renew them across democracy, right, to kind of introduce
04:46youths into the voting ballots. Yeah. So there was a sense of acknowledgement that youths are now a
04:51legitimate voting bloc. If they could only vote 21 and above back then, now 18 years, from 18 years old,
04:58now fresh out of school, you're allowed to vote. So there's a sense of acknowledgement that, okay,
05:02now youths, Malay youths, for our report anyway, are now allowed to be part of the political process.
05:08So there's a sense of acknowledgement there. And not just acknowledgement in terms of a democratic
05:13process, but also acknowledging them as legitimate citizens, right, who not only have voting rights,
05:18but also acknowledged as part of maybe potential leaders. They allowed a much earlier start in life
05:25to do that now. Resentment, however, comes a lot from the discussions that we had with these youths.
05:31So even though there was acknowledgement from a political perspective or democratic perspective,
05:35the resentment comes from the fact that in simple terms, the institutions have not changed with the
05:42law. So when we're talking about democratic structures, political structures, a lot of it is
05:47still driven and prioritized for those who are older. So I don't know, we can talk about maybe elderly
05:53politicians, people who are maybe 40 and above. These are people who are still policymakers,
05:57leaders of industry, leaders of, they are the decision makers. So there is a lot of lip service,
06:04I think, that came into the election saying that, oh, youths are the future, your future leaders,
06:08your vote is important, we want your voice. But in a lot of the policymaking process, in a lot of the
06:14decision making process, a lot of youths felt that they were resentful in that sense that, oh,
06:19there's a lot of promises for you to be part of the political process. But yet,
06:22it is very limited in the sense where we want to talk about campaigning, for example, right?
06:29We had several youth individuals who we spoke to that talked about how, oh yeah, I mean,
06:33generally speaking, yeah, political parties would say, we put X number of
06:39under 30 or under 35 candidates in certain areas. And that is kind of used as a tagline to say,
06:44we are youth friendly, or we focus on youth. But however, if you examine these areas more closely,
06:50you realise, oh, these candidates are put in black zones, where they are not expected to win,
06:54for example, unwinnable seats, unwinnable seats, very few resources are given, but that is usually
06:59not talked about. So that's an example, that's one of the examples, one of the stories that was given,
07:04right? This idea that political acknowledgement of the youths are simply just, well, it's simply just
07:13lip service. There's also other areas such as institutions, access to institutions,
07:18access to public spaces, and community. So there's a lot of resentment that grew out of the fact that
07:24even though Undi 18 was built, even though there was a promise by government and democratic systems
07:31to acknowledge youths as part of the system, the system did not move beyond that. So a lot of
07:38a lot of the groundwork to allow youths to be part of the system was not an accident.
07:41Can you elaborate what you mean by some of the anxieties or the resentment is also
07:45having a lack of access to public institutions? What do you mean by that?
07:49So if we go to the northern states and east coast in particular, there's a lot of question about
07:55access to resources. I'll go for the simplest one, which is accessing state resources, just aid or
08:03maybe pathways to maybe getting things started. So one of the most salient ones to me that I still
08:08remember to this day is the fact that there was a group of Malay youths up in Peralis who wanted to
08:13start a mental health movement. And a lot of this was inspired because during the pandemic,
08:18they saw a lot of their peers going through a lot of mental health difficulties. And they felt that
08:22we wanted to kind of bridge that to KKM in their local area, and maybe get in touch with local
08:29psychologists and whatnot. But when they went to the state government or the local authority, they got
08:36stonewalled or they didn't, they weren't able to kind of get those sort of resources or how do you even get
08:40started, right? How do we organize a movement? How do we register? Who do I meet to? Who do I meet?
08:45Who do I need to speak to? And there was a realization in that entire process that the only way I can access
08:52institutions and help resources is if I go through a political party. So that would mean that in these
09:00areas will be passed or UMNO. If the only way I can access these institutions effectively is if I go through
09:08the local branch, UMNO branch or past branch. And for a lot of these youths, they are apolitical.
09:14For them, there's a lot of distrust towards politics and political parties because it is seen as
09:20a dirty industry or politicians cannot be trusted. So as much as they could, they do not want to be,
09:28they do not want to access through that path because then they would feel like they would be used
09:31politically as well. Right, but they see that as the only avenue to access public institutions?
09:36One of the most effective ones. If not, there's a lot of, there's a lot of needing to go through
09:41paperwork. Barriers. Barriers, yeah. I need to go to the office over and over again, find the right
09:46person, find a person willing to help you with resources. So a lot of the, a lot of the resentment
09:50and I guess inaccessibility, inaccessibility of these resources, I think make them feel like,
09:56yeah, I mean, I'm excluded from the system in that sense, right? Unless I have a political backing.
10:01Okay, so this is colloquially we call cable, cable. If you have cable, then you can get things done.
10:08So the disillusionment, the resentment is based from seeing this system being entrenched.
10:15Yeah. And I mean, that's just one aspect. But if you're talking also about aid, for example, right,
10:20aid or even public services by local authorities, if you're talking about aid, a lot of youths are
10:25also resentful, I think, in the sense where there's a perception towards them, being Bumi Putra Malay,
10:31that we receive a lot of, what's the word? The negative of them is tongkat, but you can call it
10:38Malay privilege or Bumi Putra privilege, basically, you know, access to institutions and whatnot,
10:42quota system. I like that. I haven't heard that in a long time. Tongkat. Yeah, yeah. I see that used
10:47a lot still, but mostly by the side of older generation. Like to prop them up. Is it like
10:50privilege? Okay. Yeah. So when we were discussing questions of Malay privilege, Bumi Putra privilege,
10:57they would mention that I don't benefit in any of the system because when I try to get a
11:01loan to start a business, I still have to go through the normal process of a bank. They're not going to give
11:05me a loan because my credit score is not great. Or for example, I want to get an education loan through
11:11Mara. I either need cable in Mara or it's very difficult for me to be able to get any sort of
11:19loan from institutions that are supposed on paper to help me. So in the end, I still have to kind of
11:23go through the normal way of PTPTN. I still have to pay off my bank loans. I still need to get a job
11:28just like any other person. I can't get a good paying job maybe unless I have cable again, right? So
11:33there is this feeling that this extends the idea that there are Bumi Putra policies that are supposed
11:40to benefit me is not benefiting me. And then this is idea that a lot of it is because of the excesses
11:46of corruption, the excesses of cable. So there is also a resentment against the political class because
11:52there is this perception and belief that the system that was supposed to benefit them
11:58is being abused and used by the elite, the political elite. So that's why you started seeing.
12:04And I think to some extent, that's also why PAS has a lot of appeal because PAS historically,
12:11and even until now, are seen as a grassroots party, the party of the people, right? I mean,
12:15this is a political party that has its beginnings from basically the ground, right? I mean,
12:21if you talk about, if you see how they mobilize, if you see how they do a lot of the engagement work,
12:25it is very grassroots, right? It is also the, they also frame themselves as kind of anti-elite.
12:31If you think about very egalitarian, yeah, is like the perfect example of a person who lives
12:37like a normal person, not in a big bungalow, doesn't drive an expensive car. And people still remember
12:41the image of PAS as the party of the people. So that's why this political, anti-political elite idea,
12:48I think among the youths, is quite strong, which is why PAS has another, if it's not Islam,
12:53at the very least, there's this idea that PAS is a grassroots party that cares about people issues.
12:59Right. Even if they're not good at governance. Can I ask you, so were, I know Malay youth is not
13:04monolithic across the country. Were there differences that you notice or observed by region, by class,
13:13in how they responded to some of your questions? Yeah. I see that a lot when it comes to how
13:20they maybe discuss things like race, or how they discuss things like relationship between,
13:26well, actually a lot of the differences I think will come down to kind of like race-based
13:31discussions. In different regions? In different regions. So, if I spoke to someone,
13:36say in central regions, that would be more Klang Valley, Negris Milan-ish area,
13:40there's less anxiety or resentment around questions of DAP, for example, or perhaps
13:50perceptions of Chinese dominance in certain economic areas. But if I went up to the northern
13:54states, especially Kedah, and this is so true for Kedah, and Kelantan in particular, is the question of
14:03how they perceive the non-Malay, or to be more specific, to perceive the Chinese community.
14:10And they will always point towards Penang as kind of the example of a non-Malay community that
14:16refuses to assimilate, does not want to use the Malay language. And there's a lot of the racial
14:22rhetoric that maybe we hear from right-wing groups, or maybe conservative Malay nationalists. This is what I
14:27hear most coming from these regions. But less so when I talk to individuals coming from the central.
14:35If I understand correctly, there were regional differences, socio-economic class differences
14:40as well, when looking at racial relations. But across the board acts disillusionment and resentment
14:48towards political elites. It's still there.
14:51When you went into starting this long research and then talking to your respondents, were you
15:01expecting this? I mean, a lot of this we suspected, but you've made it concrete with backed by evidence.
15:09Were you surprised by the findings of your results? Were there areas or nuances that you were quite
15:16you were surprised yourself to learn? Because we have spoken a lot about the economic disillusionment.
15:25And I think that cuts across all generations, right? So it's not just young people who feel this way,
15:30but a lot of the different generations as well are feeling some kind of the class resentment.
15:35But did you find any nuance in your findings that you thought, oh, this is quite surprising,
15:41specifically for youth? There were two things that surprised me, which I feel like there's an
15:46opportunity there for intervention, right? The first is that, despite what I said earlier about
15:54more antagonistic views towards non-Malese, I have to also clarify that within the personal
16:01life of these individuals, they have very, very positive views of intergroup relationships,
16:08friendships. Oh, okay. Friendships. To be more exact, not religious, but friendships.
16:12And a lot of this is because a lot of these youths end up going to public university,
16:16and they talk a lot about how public university is kind of like the first time, because they grow
16:20out in majority Malay communities, it's the first time they interacted with a non-Malay,
16:25but it was a neutral, positive space where they can engage with each other, they can learn,
16:31they can navigate the relationship with respect, without the intervention of political parties or any
16:37party that has an agenda. So, a lot of them walk out talking about how they had really,
16:41really positive views of, they believe, in fact, in the idea that Malaysia has a multicultural DNA.
16:49Of course, there are some caveats to that, red lines around agama, Islam, some red lines around race,
16:56mostly Islam actually. But however, the general view is that, yeah, Malaysia is multicultural,
17:01I embrace that. I actually want that. That's who we are as people, right? So, that's kind of like the
17:05first view, right? And that tells me a lot that there is an opportunity then to create spaces or to
17:11activate spaces where maybe there should be more intergroup interactions, right? To form social cohesion.
17:18Because I think there is, the youths want that. They like that because they feel like, and one of them
17:23even use the word, it's exciting. It's exciting having friends from other races, because that's kind of like how
17:28life is supposed to be like, right? There are other people, you learn about them, your positive
17:32relationship, you learn so much more about the world in that manner. Which then comes to my second
17:37point, is when we talk about spaces or at least the sort of material reality they inhabit. And I think
17:46this is not so much surprising to me, but more like it hammers the point home. I think a lot of us, when we
17:52talk about any group, I think for example, any person for example, I think what we usually like is kind of like
17:58putting, having empathy or at least trying to understand where they come from, why they form
18:01the views that they do. And because our field work, we're all about field work, we're all about
18:06going down on the ground, kind of inhabiting. So a lot of it for me was actually being able to go
18:12into places like Perlis, having the privilege and I think opportunity to go to places like Bandar Perda
18:16in Penang, mainland to go to Perlis, to go to Kelantan, to kind of go into the kampongs, to go into the cities and kind of
18:23see for myself and understand, ah, this is why they think the way they do it. Because they grew
18:28up in this context, this environment. That there is an environmental context to the answers that
18:33they've given you, right? Yeah, let's say for example, you go to mainland Penang and you stay there
18:39and I spent like a few days there with some of the youths. I then began to realize, ah, so this is why
18:45there's resentment against island side. Because you start comparing how not so developed mainland
18:53Penang is, Bandar Perda and, um, um, and it is surrounding areas compared to say Georgetown or
19:00Penang Island, where it's very industrious. And then there's also then the question of like,
19:05demographic majority of non-Malays live in Penang Island. The state government, when it comes down to
19:10state planning, a lot of resources are pushed towards state, ah, towards the island, towards the, ah,
19:15towards Sebramperai, where the industries are. So that then clicked to me that no wonder then,
19:21Prikatan National had a lot of appeal because they are riding on what they recognize as, I'm experiencing
19:27a reality that matches with political anxieties. So it's very difficult to sit in kind of an ivory tower
19:34in Putrajaya and relate and understand why. I understand, I see where you're coming from. Now,
19:40I want to ask you why it's important that we pay attention to how Malay youths are feeling. We look
19:48around the region, right? We see what's happening in Nepal. We've just seen what's happened in Indonesia.
19:53And if we were to not address this, I think there is a risk that it becomes entrenched and
20:00become something more. So if you, Azif, were briefing political parties and civil society groups
20:07about how to address what you have discovered in your research, what would you advise them to do?
20:14What should they stop doing and what should they start doing properly? I think the one thing I haven't
20:19mentioned throughout this entire interview because it's mainstay and everyone's affected by it is
20:23obviously economy. So questions of kind of building up career pathways for a lot of youth so that they
20:29don't have to go to gig work. They don't necessarily have to go to entrepreneurship or are forced to go into
20:33entrepreneurship. So I think the economy question is a very salient one. And I think government
20:38recognizes that. But building an economy is not sufficient because a lot of youths talk about
20:45Najib Razak. They talk about a lot of what One Malaysia kind of offered, which is the idea of a shared
20:50national vision. So this is lacking in the current government, right? Economy Madani, Malaysia Madani,
20:55what does it mean? A lot of us don't connect with. But One Malaysia, 10, 15 years onwards,
21:00even 10 years. So a lot of these kids maybe were in school at that time, but they still remember One
21:04Malaysia. So there is this desire, I think, to be able to map Malaysia somewhere in the future.
21:09They can't see it. So one other thing that I think government and CSUs can also do is how do we
21:15build a roadmap that genuinely involves the youths as part of national discourse. Under the Barisan
21:22government back then, they had this thing called Transformation National 50, which was amazing as
21:29an idea because what you had was that it was a bottom-up approach. You got youths to go to
21:35discussion events or what is it called stakeholder events where they can weigh in on issues of
21:41security, talk about economy, talk about the future when it comes to Malaysia's place in the global
21:45global stage. So a lot of TN50, I think, was something that some of the youths that we spoke to
21:52talked about a lot, how that felt like genuine decision-making.
21:57Oh, they remembered.
21:58They remember it very well. I mean, the slightly older ones who went through the Barisan national era.
22:03So this idea is that you, the idea also is that you kind of need to provide a space to feel,
22:08to make youths feel like they are a legitimate part of the democratic system.
22:12And that means offering them a voice and also seriously implementing some of these ideas
22:18to last beyond elder politicians' lifetimes, right? Because you're talking about planning 20 years
22:22ahead, 30 years ahead. These youths will eventually become industry leaders. Even if they don't become
22:27industry leaders, they will become leaders of their own community, which is equally important.
22:32So there is a need, I think, to open up the democratic space as well. And then, of course,
22:36there is another question of space as well. We need to build and encourage and activate more shared
22:44spaces to allow social inclusion. I love that. Yes.
22:46And to me, that is very important. We saw a faint idea of this in Barisan nationals again,
22:54flawed national surveys. But I think they had an idea of kind of bringing everyone together.
22:59There was a flawed methodology to it, but the idea was there. And I think because now the only space
23:04where youths can kind of meet together is public universities and public universities should not
23:09hold the burden of being able to do that. Of course, not everyone is able to go to public
23:12universities, right? You have people who end up going to private universities, for example,
23:17or even go overseas. So maybe there is a need to also think about how do you create community
23:23spaces? Because that's important. By opening up and activating community spaces where social
23:29cohesion can happen, you also want to allow youths to do events in those areas, do programs in those
23:36areas that create community. With community, you create belonging. And with belonging, you form a
23:41sense of meaning. And for these youths, they like these two things. They like belonging because there's
23:45no spaces for them to be able to have programs, to form community. But because they aren't able to
23:51form a sense of belonging to their community, that's why they feel a loss of meaning. Yeah.
23:56So when you feel a loss of meaning, they feel like, who am I in part of this entire fabric of what
24:00Malaysia is? Who am I as part of society? Am I just a person who works day to day? Am I just a
24:05person who has a loose network of friends? But where am I located in my community? And therefore,
24:11where is my community located in the larger broader picture of Malaysia? Wonderful. So belonging is
24:16something that they should really focus on. As if so, this is interesting. What has come out of this
24:23research? So this has been an effort to look at Malay youths. But what are you going to focus on
24:28next? So interestingly, when we talk about Malay youths, and I know there is an exhaust,
24:34there's quite a focus on problematizing the Malays. But we realized as we went a year in,
24:39is that we realized actually nobody has actually spoken to non-Malay youths. Nobody has spoken to the
24:46Indian community. Nobody has spoken to the Chinese community. What do they think about being part of
24:49Malaysia? Whether their anxieties and aspirations are the same. Whether it's mapped. And I think
24:53that's useful because if you can find a sort of shared thread between all of us, then we can find,
24:58you can realize that actually this is a problem that affects everyone and not just a problem that
25:02affects a specific community. The Malay community may be a majority, but everyone is kind of like on
25:06the same boat. We're all on the same boat in Malaysia. So one of the projects that we are working
25:10on right now is actually exploring very specifically Chinese youths and Indian youths. So we're asking them
25:16about questions of belonging. Again, how do they feel as Malaysians? How do they feel as part of this
25:21natural fabric? Questions of economy, questions of what they think about what intra-group problems are.
25:26So with the Indian community, we are touching a little bit on questions of caste. How does that
25:30affect politics? How does that affect relationships between themselves with the Chinese community?
25:34We're talking about media. What is the place of China? How does China affect their identities and
25:39sense of belonging as Malaysians? So there's a very vast, exciting area I think that we're looking at,
25:43which I'm frankly more excited for than my Malaysia study back then. So yeah, very exciting times.
25:48And I think leading up to elections, we hope that with all these findings, political parties,
25:54CSOs as well, because they're an important part of the ecosystem, will work towards rebuilding back
26:00this idea of like a cohesive Malaysia. It doesn't need to be one Malaysia, it just needs to be,
26:04we just need to give Malaysians a sense that we can look five years ahead, we can look 10 years ahead.
26:09And I think that's really, we have a fog right now. A lot of it has to do maybe with geopolitics,
26:15the global order, what's going on there right now. But at least within Malaysia, if you can say that
26:20in five years, this is where we're going to go. In 10 years, we're going to go and everyone is on
26:24the same boat. And I think that will be helpful. Yeah, it helps to feel if we're all on the same team.
26:28Yeah. Aziz, I'm excited for the next research. So keep me posted on that. Hopefully,
26:34we'll have you back on to talk about. I will actually bring my researchers to talk. I mean,
26:37I think they deserve the space to be able to talk about their own communities. Absolutely.
26:40Thank you for sharing the research, this research with us. We appreciate your time. Thank you.
26:44That's all the time we have for you on this episode of Consider This. I'm Melissa Idris,
26:48signing off for the evening. Thank you so much for watching. Good night.
Be the first to comment